Macca's Searching for Gateshead Guys (1996)

Only photograph I can find of Paul when he was 11 years old.

 This story bring so many questions:  First of all -- did the Five Guys ever come forward?  Did Derek talk to any of them before he passed away in 1997?   Has Paul ever mentioned these story since this original telling?  And what project was Derek working on?

Macca's Searching for Gateshead Guys

No writer listed

Gateshead Post

July 18, 1996

    Five influential Gateshead guys believed to have had an unconscious effect in molding the success of the Beatles need to be traced for a new project. Derek Taylor, the Beatles' press officer since 1963, is currently trying to track down Five Guys from Gateshead who Paul McCartney recalls seeing in a talent contest at Butlin's holiday camp in Pwllheli, North Wales, when he was 11 years old.

     Paul remembers it was the way the Five Guys were dressed that impressed him so much, not their act. He said. "They all had on these little tartan flat caps with a grey crew neck sweater, tartan shorts, pumps, and white towels under their arms. They walked in a line across the pool and then had a good old swim. I noticed everyone's heads go,  'Who's that?' And in that second, a little penny dropped for me, and I realized the power of just looking something. They won the talent contest at Butlins that week, and you knew they'd win," he added. 

    Derek believes the visual impact the Five Guys had on Paul may have influenced the way that later the Beatles saw the strength in dressing the same way on stage. 

    Derek said he'd never heard Paul mention it before, and it only came up when they were all sat chatting about the good old days while putting together the Anthology. Derek said, "We need to trace them as soon as possible to fit them in our next project, which will be coming out later in the year." So if you are one of the Five Guys from Gateshead or know where to find them, get in touch with the Post.